My Work Space

I meant to do this post a while ago, but I had to clean up said work space. ahem Lol! I got the questions for this post from Jodie Llewellyn’s Blog, who got the idea from The YA League. Fun, fun. ^_^

Writing Habits1. Typed or Handwritten?
I write bits and pieces of stuff by hand when I’m away from the computer, and I do all my planning and story boarding by hand, but when it comes to drafting it’s typing all the way. You put a kink in your neck typing from a notebook too many times, and you will never want to do it again.

2. Cursive or Printed?
Both. I have some really nice hybrid handwriting when I take the time. Otherwise it looks like a bunch of loops. Very rarely can I not read my own handwriting, though this has been known to happen quite a bit when I’m rereading old journal entries. Ha.

3. Show us your favorite pen.
Just one? Hmm…while I love the colorful Pilot pens for journal entries, I feel they “bleed” too much for the composition books so I use the the Pilot pen on the far right for outlining and story notes and such. I’m rather obsessed with pens. I have many other pens, and sometimes I story board with a blue or purple PaperMate pen, but lately I’ve been on these pens and use the other ones for random stuff.

4. Where do you like to write?
At my fancy desk like a civilized person. Lol! I got this desk last year as birthday present for myself to replace a tiny corner desk. Put the top part together by hand until I finally got frustrated and ran out to buy a power drill. It was all worth it though. It’s like my own little personal writer cave. ^_^

*Do note the scary amount of Hello Kitty plushies on my desk. There are two more bigger ones in the room. ^_^

Cassandra Clare because I feel like my personal style is closer to hers, even though I write in 1st person sometimes.
Suzanne Collins because she is awesome and is one of the main reasons I was able to get my butt in gear a few years ago.
JK Rowling for being awesome enough to get me to read and keep reading a book about a little boy wizard.
AG Howard because she has that dark & humorous thing going on that I like to think I have as well. Plus, I like me some dark humor.
Kathryn Lasky for having the most beautiful writing style I have ever had the privilege of reading in my entire life.

6. What are you your three favorite books on writing?
I haven’t even read three. I’ve read two: Making Shapely Fiction and The First Five Pages, and the second one would have to be my favorite by default as I don’t remember anything about the first one.

7. Have you ever competed in NaNoWriMo?
Twice. The energy around NaNo time is just insane. I love it. ^_^

8. Have you ever won NaNoWriMo?
Once, last year. The first time I freaked out about 20k into my story and spent the rest of the month trying to ditch the story. But last year, I held on and crossed the finished line! (Yay!) Only I still chucked the story a month later because my characters were just not getting the job done.

9. Have you ever had anything published?
Soon. ^_^

10. What projects are you working on now?
I can outline and draft at the same time, but I can only actually draft one story at a time and right now that is a dark YA fantasy set in Maine, currently dubbed “The Fury.” ^_^

11. What is your soundtrack to writing?
I like silence when I write. Every once in a while I may play a song to help set the mood for a certain scene (or drown out some kind of annoying external noise), usually Evanescence, electronic, or symphonic rock, sometimes something else, but once the mood is set (or the distraction is gone), it’s silence again.

12. Do you have a writing pump-up song?
I play around a bit on the keyboard and sometimes. I have a couple right now for my current project that I’m working on that put me in the mood to write. I also have Mind Heist by Zack Hemsey from the Inception soundtrack, Out of the Shadows by Cut One, and a few songs by Kristin Amarie on repeat (Fra Beatrice, Elusion, & Evening Bells). I’ve linked a few below so you can listen to them if you’ve never heard them. They’re all pretty perfect for what I’m working on and I listen to at least one of them every single day.

Now I leave you with two more desk pictures. ^^
Lovely, lovely works in progress composition books. ^^ The red one on the left is actually an iPad case. How freaking cool is that!!!

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16 Responses to My Work Space

Lovelyyyy writing space! And that iPad case is super cool!
Like you, I hardly write with music ever, except if I’m out at a noisy place. Haven’t read books by the last two of your favorite authors, so I should get on that. But your first three are part of my favorite too! Cassandra Clare’s Infernal Devices rocked! I’m yet to start her Mortal Instruments series but I have three of them waiting for me on my Kindle. She writes with a kind of humor I find incredibly fascinating, and so does J.K Rowling. I love Suzanne Collins’ mastery of tension.
“The Fury” rocks as a title. Write on!

Thank you! Isn’t it?! I swear that iPad case is the best thing ever. Lol! I haven’t started the Infernal Devices, but I have book one downloaded and ready to go! Kathryn Lasky has a ton of books about talking owls that I’ve never read, but I LOVE her mermaid books, and I have a couple of historical fiction books by her as well. And dude! I am so relieved I finally have a working title I can keep. ^_^

I know. I should have pulled all my pens out. I’m also a notorious pen thief, though I will be nice sometimes and say, “hey, I’m stealing yer pen,” before I swipe it. Lol!

Thank you! That’s one of the reasons I had to replace my other desk. I had no room for anything and stuff was spilling over onto the furniture. My printer is actually upstairs. I had to put it up there before, but now I’ve gotten used to it and kind of like not having to look at it.

And Kathryn Lasky–she wrote children’s historical fiction that I devoured, like the Royal Diaries series and a couple of the Dear America books. I kept those books. They’re in my closet because I loved them so much but I don’t have space on my bookshelves to keep them out.

Yes! I’m going to have to get those Royal Diaries books. I didn’t know that. She’s a rather new author to me, I only found her a few years ago. I have all her mermaid books, which are historical actually, now that I’m thinking about it and then I have Portraits and The Night Journey.

Love your work space! I usually write my outlines, first ideas, and all those other beginning stuff by hand and then hit the computer too. Cute Hello Kitties–with those smiling at you, you’re writing has to go well 😉

Thanks, Tonja!
There’s just something about making all those notes by hand that gets the creative process started for me. 🙂 Plus, there’s something about the notebook that helps me focus. The Hello Kitties are adorable, aren’t they? I love them. ^_^

Thank you. ^_^
It completely transformed my living room as I had to get rid of an end table and move some things around to fit it there. I tried to get myself to where I could write to music because I lived in an apartment complex with thin walls and loud neighbors for 4 years, but I was never able to get there.